


the best you ever had

by firstaudrina



Series: the best you ever had [1]
Category: Gossip Girl
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-01
Updated: 2015-05-01
Packaged: 2018-03-26 16:33:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3857470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firstaudrina/pseuds/firstaudrina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When did Dan get so gay, again?</p>
            </blockquote>





	the best you ever had

This is the backstory:

Going home with Serena is neither Dan's best idea nor his worst, but they're drunk enough that it doesn't make much of a difference either way. It's a thing they do sometimes, when Serena can't find anyone she likes and Dan is exceptionally morose. They get to have a nice nostalgic night, no stress and no strings. 

Nate goes home alone that night, trying to be better; Blair is dating some horrible stockbroker, so she goes off with him; Dan is moody over Blair's horrible stockbroker, so he goes home with Serena; Serena is just trying to have a good time, which she usually does.

None of which explains Dan ending up in bed with Carter Baizen. But in his defense, it's a difficult thing to explain. 

 

 

This is the start:

Dan is having a dream about sex, a sex dream, the kind where everything is impossibly clever and sweet, and the girl in his arms is no one he knows but everything he wants. What's clearest about it is the kissing, hot languid kissing that sweeps through him and settles in a knot right in his stomach. It's the kind of dream that feels real but heightened, his skin heating and fingers clenching with astonishing physicality for a dream. A hand slides teasingly over Dan's chest, a voice says –

A voice says: "Beautiful, it's almost eight. They called up with a car."

A _male_ voice.

But what startles Dan awake more than that is Serena loudly exclaiming _oh fuck_ and scrambling over him out of the bed like a very lovely and slightly ungainly cat. This is followed by laughter, _male_ laughter, and Dan realizes a half-second before he opens his eyes that Carter is here.

Carter is often at Serena's in between stints in rehab and mysteriously funded jaunts to foreign countries. She seems to get a kick out of him, though Dan has personally never seen the appeal. He's learned to avoid her apartment when Carter's crashing on the couch, unless he wants to be teased mercilessly about basically everything.

Case in point: upon opening his eyes, Dan is immediately greeted by Carter's wicked grin. "Good morning, Brooklyn. Have a good time last night? It sounded _real_ good from the living room. I had no idea you were so loud."

From the bathroom, Serena calls, "You be nice!"

"I'm being nice," Carter says, mildly offended.

He's tucked up along Dan's side where he crawled in to wake Serena and shows no sign of moving despite having completed his task. Dan wishes he could say it was the first time he woke up to Carter dropping into bed with them. It's probably closer to the fifth. 

Carter drums his fingers on Dan's chest and is half-heartedly swatted away. "Were you having a sexy dream, Dan?"

Before Dan can reply in a sufficiently sarcastic manner, Serena re-emerges with her face pink and freshly washed, hair thrown up in a ballerina bun. She's somewhat haphazardly dressed in a sports bra and faux-paint splattered leggings. Carter wolf-whistles. Serena slingshots a hair band at him with surprisingly good aim. "Creep," she accuses. She starts rifling through her drawers for something. "If I'm late for another shoot, I'm going to be in so much trouble."

"No you're not," Carter says lazily, fingertips again tapping over Dan's chest. "You're Serena van der Woodsen. They're probably sitting around staring at the clock and waiting for you."

"That doesn't actually make me feel better." She pulls on a gray hoodie. "Okay. I am leaving now. Don't –"

"Invite anyone over, do any drugs, or set anything on fire," Carter recites. "Which, I might remind you, was both _totally by accident_ and also kind of your fault."

Serena gives him an unconvinced look. "And don't be mean to Dan, alright?"

"I'm just teasing," Carter says, giving Dan's side a pinch. "I won't molest your boyfriend."

"He's not my _boyfriend_ ," Serena says just as Dan goes, "I'm _not_ her boyfriend," which makes her laugh a little, declaring, "You owe me a Coke."

Serena takes another moment to survey the both of them, ensconced as they are in her pink bedsheets, which Dan is arranging rather purposefully around his hips while Carter lounges without a hint of discomfort. A curious, almost playful expression crosses her face. She looks right at Carter when she says, "Don't do anything I wouldn't do." And then she's off. 

This leaves Dan and Carter behind in her very comfortable bed, which sits in a pool of early morning sunshine that makes it deliciously, invitingly warm. Dan is tired and just this side of hungover, but also very conscious of the fact that he's naked and a little hard whereas Carter is basically fully dressed, and also an asshole. It seems like a bad mix. 

It _is_ a bad mix.

"You were having a sexy dream, weren't you, Brooklyn?" Carter asks, voice open and even like he isn't trying to get a rise out of Dan. So to speak. "I could tell because you were moaning a little when I came in. Thought I was interrupting something good."

Indignant, Dan says, "I was not."

"Mm, you were." The fabric of Carter's t-shirt is old and soft against Dan's arm; it's full of holes too, gaps in the gray revealing tan skin. "I touched you by accident waking up Serena, and especially then –" Carter gives him an impression, a low and yearning moan.

Eloquently, Dan says, "Fuck off."

"I can also tell because you've got a hard-on," Carter adds, matter-of-fact. His gaze flicks down, and Dan rearranges the sheets, scowling.

"It's the morning," he grumbles. 

Carter's fingernails are a dull, teasing scratch along Dan's ribs. "What were you dreaming about? Our gorgeous ex-girlfriend, perhaps? Reliving the night before the morning after? I can respect it. I mean, those tits alone. Impossible to get out of your head."

Thinking of Serena or Serena's tits is the opposite of helpful at a moment like this. Dan takes a breath. Carter's fingers follow the dip in his stomach. 

"Must've been good to make you…" Carter's fingertips are at the edge of the pink sheet like maybe he's going to do something crazy, like push it away or slip his hand underneath. The thought sends a pulse of heat through Dan and really, the sheet isn't rumpled enough to provide much room for denial. 

Dan's gaze rounds towards Carter, looking very out of place in this sun-filled, pastel enclave with his black jeans and dark gray shirt, hair rumpled in an on-purpose way, all of it conspiring to make him look as much the bad boy archetype as possible. It would be ridiculous, it would be hilarious, it would be a lot of things if Dan didn't have an erection he was trying to pretend wasn't happening. 

Carter looks at him with a kind of teasing intent that makes Dan's skin prickle. "Say something, Brooklyn," he prods. "Did you think I was going to touch your dick?" 

There's a beat and then Carter's mocking softens, twisting up Dan's insides. "I could, if you wanted…" His hand moves over Dan's skin so very lightly, hardly any contact but somehow all sensation. "I bet you've got a nice dick. Pretty. Bet it looks real good with those sharp, skinny hips…"

As wryly as he can manage with his mouth as dry as it is, Dan asks, "Are you always like this?"

It's just a jumbling of words. Dan might as well have said _blue monkey umbrella tree?_ for all that his brain is actually processing the things coming out of his mouth. 

"You think I'm fucking with you."

"Aren't you?"

Carter shrugs, tilts his head as though to say _little bit_. But, "Doesn't mean I wouldn't suck you off." He grins that little knife-grin, equally mean and entertained. "Most straight guys don't think that counts."

Dan sits up, grateful for the way the sheet pools in his lap. "Okay, alright, I get it – you're an asshole, you like to pull this kind of shit with me, I don't know if it's deep-seated Serena resentment or just run of the mill rich kid bullshit, but –"

As a general rule, Dan is not that way inclined. The gay way, that is. This is not without some flexibility, though Dan never really examined his sexuality or his feelings about it all that closely. He'd only ever fallen for girls. It didn't feel like something he had to think about.

But when Carter puts his hand flat on the center of Dan's chest and pushes him back against the bed, well. Dan thinks maybe he should've paid it _some_ thought.

"You talk too much," Carter drawls. 

"I've been told," Dan says. "Though I think people exaggerate."

The candy pink sheet is now riding dangerously low. If Dan was half-hard before, Carter pinning him down has effectively completed the process. The sheet isn't doing Dan any favors this time, caught under one hip and pulled tight across his lap, and he's clearly straining against it, an obvious outline. Carter's considering gaze sweeps over him. He wets his lips. Dan truly hopes his dick doesn't twitch or anything.

Carter leans in, leans down, and Dan's eyes fall closed as his lips part for a kiss that doesn't come. Instead Carter's mouth lands hot on his collarbone, up over his throat, down over his chest. Carter's lips part against Dan's ribs, trail over his stomach. Teeth appear unexpectedly, little nips and surprisingly hard bites interrupting the soft drag of his mouth. Dan doesn't know which will come next, a bite or a kiss, and it reminds him of his dream: all heat and utterly unreal.

Obnoxious to the end, Carter asks, "This a game you really wanna play, Danny?" His tongue flicks out over Dan's nipple.

"Not if you're gonna call me that," Dan breathes. 

Carter smirks. "Alright, handsome," he says, and another wet bite leaves its momentary mark on Dan's skin. "Question still stands."

Perhaps surprising himself less than expected, Dan says, "Yeah. I want to." He says it clearly, without even a hitch. 

Another slow smile crosses Carter's face before he says, "Okay," softly, almost soothingly, like he's not a total ass or something. Then he gets serious, hands curling around Dan's wrists so he can push them towards the quilted headboard. His fingertips trace the length of Dan's arms as they move all the way back down to his hips. 

And then Carter pulls the sheet away.

The room feels hotter then, and that hitch Dan was missing before seems to have found its way into his throat. He is very naked, counterpoint to Carter who is essentially fully dressed and also subject to a whole lot baggage that is suddenly hitting Dan at once (naked) – like, Carter is another misbegotten love of Serena's life, Carter is a junkie, Carter is generally not a very nice person. He's also a guy, a guy looking down at Dan like he wants to cannibalize him. It's a series of revelations that aren't really revelations at all, and Dan kind of wishes he'd had them before the fooling around commenced.

Not that it would have made any difference. Dan likes to fuck disaster. He's done enough soul-searching to figure that one out.

He wonders why Carter isn't kissing him but is too embarrassed to ask.

Carter seems to be busy giving him an excruciatingly long once-over. "Looks like I guessed right," he says but does not clarify before his mouth is on Dan again, and Dan ceases to care about clarification. 

Carter puts himself between Dan's legs so he can lick the jut of Dan's hipbone, sink teeth into Dan's thigh. Dan moans a little, sound slipping out before he can swallow it down, and he feels Carter smile. 

"Straight boys are so easy," he says. 

He doesn't touch Dan's dick at all, now so hard it curves up towards his stomach, but instead leaves flushed, mouth-shaped marks all over the inside of Dan's thighs; instead takes Dan's balls into his mouth for long, torturous minutes; instead moves lower, closer, curls his tongue briefly against contracting flesh but doesn't do more. Then he pulls away.

"Open your eyes," Carter tells him, so Dan does, meeting Carter's immediately. They're heavy-lidded, sleepy almost, and seem to glitter with dangerous invitation – that's how he looks pretty much all the time, predatory and sexual. But it's never been directed at Dan before now and that is…certainly something. "You've never been with a man?"

Dan pushes up on his elbows, feeling a sudden unexpected buzzing in his limbs when he does so, like his body is an appliance left running too long. "Nate and I hooked up once," he offers, but it was in a gross club bathroom and it never went anywhere, so it probably doesn't count. 

Carter snorts. "Sounds like our Nathaniel. That's it?"

"That's it," Dan confirms before adding dryly, "I'm not really in the habit." Carter's hands are stroking up and down his thighs. Dan stamps down on the urge to fidget. 

Carter surveys him thoughtfully. "So nobody's ever fucked you?"

"Well," Dan says, "That's a different question."

Georgina had a real thing about it, actually. She went in for the whole deal, strap-ons and everything, and Dan was mostly along for the ride. Not that he was exactly complaining. 

Carter is bent double laughing by the time Dan finishes explaining. "Fucking hell. Always knew I liked that crazy bitch." He grins, straightening a little so he can lean over Dan. "Makes my job easier." His hand comes up to cup Dan's cheek, fingertips trailing over the shape of his mouth. "Suck."

Considering he's pretty much in it to win it at this point, Dan parts his lips and follows orders, letting his cheeks hollow as Carter's fingers slide wetly in and out of his mouth. He keeps his eyes on Carter. 

" _Fuck_ ," Carter breathes. Then, like he can't wait another second, he bends to take Dan's dick into his mouth.

Dan had been over waiting too and the blunt, exquisite end to it makes him arch a little, head pressing back hard into the pillow. One hand clenches tight around nothing and he cups Carter's cheek with the other, thumb moving to feel the stretch of Carter's lips around his cock and fuck, _fuck_ – 

And Carter's damp finger is teasing, or threatening, massaging slow circles but doing little else.

Carter pulls off so he can look Dan in the eyes as his finger slides in. Dan's breath catches in his throat even as he tries to keep his body relaxed; it's always an oddly detached feeling at first, some part of someone else _in_ him, but then Carter messily kisses his thigh and it is abruptly hot. Carter's pace is unhurried, though Dan wouldn't think to call it careful or gentle – methodical, maybe, designed to take Dan right to the edge and then leave him there.

Dan finds himself rocking down a little to meet Carter, asking for more without saying a word, and god it's been so long since someone did this to him. Sometimes girls got weird if he asked for it, and doing it to himself just wasn't the same. 

"Do me a favor, huh, babe?" Carter murmurs. "Bedside drawer."

Dan barely has the motor skills to open a drawer right now but manages it anyway, finding a mess of girly ephemera like hair ties and lip glosses, Serena's secret stash of candy, and what he assumes Carter is after, a small bottle of lubricant with a bright pink label. 

Having sex in his ex-girlfriend's bed with someone who isn't her is definitely one of Dan's shadier decisions, and using her stuff probably makes it worse. None of these moral distinctions prevent Dan from doing anything, though. Oh well.

"This is not my high point, ethically speaking," Dan says, because it should at least be said.

Carter pauses to slick his fingers up. "It's actually pretty good for me," he remarks, and then he's easing two in, giving Dan a very near _roguish_ smirk.

He sucks Dan down again, lips almost meeting the base of Dan's cock, and then pulls up torturously slow. He does it a few times, takes Dan deep in his throat and swallows and then lets him slide out slow, dirty. He does it until Dan is practically clawing at the back of his neck, until Dan is good and flushed, until Dan is taking three fingers and making desperate, ridiculous noises. And then Carter says, "I want to fuck you."

It's not like Dan didn't know where this was going (though a small deluded part of him thought maybe the blowjob-with-extras might be the extent of it), but he didn't anticipate how hearing the words would feel. He's not proud of the sound that escapes him, somewhere between a moan and a hysterical laugh. 

"Can I?" Carter's fingers move in and out, and he leans up to bite Dan's throat, his shoulder. "Let me fuck you, huh, handsome? Slide my cock into you. Fuck you so hard you don't remember your own name, just mine, and you scream it."

" _Fuck_ ," Dan groans.

Carter's mouth is on his jaw now. "Would you like that? If I was inside you, so deep you couldn't breathe?"

"Oh, shut up," Dan says, eyes shut tight again, and he doesn't know why Carter keeps not fucking kissing him.

"Do you want that?" Carter's lips move over Dan's cheek, his teeth tug Dan's earlobe. "Ask for what you want."

Dan's hands rub through Carter's hair and over his neck, clutch the fabric of his t-shirt. He can feel the muscles of Carter's back through it, solid and tensed. "Yeah," Dan says, crossing that final bridge into giving in. "That's what I want. Please."

He expects mocking but Carter must want it too bad. It's the business of it now, Dan going to get himself ready while Carter locates the condoms, and then they're back on the bed. Carter is impatient and hot as he tugs his shirt off, gets his jeans open. He turns Dan over roughly, pulls his hips back, pushes his shoulders down. It's sudden but Dan is impatient too, resting on one arm so he can use the other hand to stroke himself. He waits, he wants.

"Gonna fuck you into the mattress," Carter promises, voice low. Dan presses his forehead against his forearm, too far gone to feel embarrassment about the way he leans back restlessly. He feels the scrape of denim against the back of his thighs. He feels Carter's hands and then Carter's cock, nudging at him hotter than any silicone he's had in the past. Maybe it's dumb to think but he can't help it – this feels stupidly real, not something he can write off as a game, or something he got talked into. He's not attached enough to his claimed sexuality to have a crisis over this, but it still feels like A Thing, a very _real_ thing. 

So panic flares in Dan's chest briefly and he tenses, his body and his brain no longer on quite the same page. He doesn't expect Carter to notice, but he does; to Dan's surprise, Carter pauses, hands running soothingly over Dan's sides as kisses are pressed to the nape of his neck, trailed along his back and shoulders.

"It's alright," Carter says. "You're alright. Aren't you?"

Dan takes a breath. He focuses on the feeling of Carter inside him – overwhelming in the best way and not an altogether alien sensation, just one he has to remember. "You gonna move or what?" 

Carter gives him a little bit of a swat. "Try to be a fuckin' nice guy…" he mumbles, but Dan can hear the amusement in it. His hands curl around Dan's hips, firm and steady, and he seems to pointedly take his damn time. Gradually, he pulls out and eases back in, building the heat under Dan's skin until he can barely stand it. He starts to push back against Carter, cutting off each leisurely thrust, and Carter laughs, "Alright, alright," before finally giving it to him hard like Dan wants, hips snapping, pounding into him.

Carter's hand slides up Dan's spine to tangle tight in his hair, tugging his head back. It makes Dan moan, his throat feeling exposed, strained; then Carter's other arm wraps around his waist and hauls Dan up, back flush to Carter's chest. It's probably the most skin-to-skin contact they've had at once. Carter's hand is on Dan's cock over his own, moving fast. Dan is breathless, doesn't feel anything except Carter. 

Dan had let Georgina fuck him enough times to get a taste for it but he's not sure he's ever felt this out of himself, this out of control. He barely knows Carter and barely likes him, but somehow he still decided to hand over this part of himself to Carter, for whatever reason.

Carter's rhythm is fast and persistent, roll of his hips driving him deeper each time. He lets Dan drop back down but stays pressed close – his hand over Dan's on the bed, his sweat-slicked skin hot against Dan, that rasp of denim along the back of Dan's thighs. Dan comes like that, spills over his hand and Carter's onto Serena's pink sheets. 

Before he's even caught his breath, Carter has pulled out, turned him over, and slid back in again. Dan's moan is probably louder than it was when he came, and he grips Carter's shoulders, his hair, brings his legs up around Carter's waist. 

It's not that sex usually ends when Dan comes – he's always a gentleman, ready to lend a helping hand afterwards if he happens to go first – just that he's never really been _passive_ before. He's never experienced something like this, just lying here and canting his hips up for Carter. Just taking it. He's never done that. 

So his hand runs the length of Carter's back and slides under the waistband of the jeans he is inexplicably still wearing, grabs his ass. Dan leans up a little to mouth at the line of Carter's throat, his own shoulders and neck straining. "Harder," he murmurs in Carter's ear, voice low, "I can still remember my name."

Carter huffs a laugh. "Criticizing my performance before the show's even over?"

His skin shines with sweat. His teeth sink into his lower lip in concentration. Again, Dan wants to kiss him, but again Dan doesn't do anything except let Carter press him into the mattress. The sensation of it is getting to be too much, that edge of too good that almost hurts. Dan's hip shift up as he moans Carter's name, throaty and trapped. He finds himself playing it up, urging, moaning Carter's name again and again until Carter puts a hand over his mouth with a low, breathless sound of his own. 

Dan pushes the hand away so he can tilt up and lick the line of Carter's throat, suck gently on the edge of his jaw. "C'mon, Carter," he murmurs over and over, "Carter, _Carter_ –"

A string of expletives leaves Carter's lips as he thrusts deep one last time, his tense muscles seeming to tighten all at once. It's pretty hot, actually, shoulders and arms and chest solid with more muscle than Dan's got, his lips parting and brow furrowing. Then he collapses heavily onto Dan, obnoxious to the end. Dan trails a hand up and down Carter's back, through his hair.

"Arrogant bastard," Dan says lightly. "You _would_ come from the sound of your own name."

Carter snorts before rolling off Dan, avoiding the wet spot with a wrinkle of his nose. "You know, you're not a bad fuck for a straight guy."

"Gee, thanks."

Carter gives him a wry smile and pulls a crushed pack of cigarettes from his pocket, offering one that Dan declines before lighting up himself. 

After a minute, Dan says, "Don't tell Serena?" He hates how hesitant it sounds. "We'll just…clean up." He frowns down at the sheets. "That won't be at all suspicious."

Carter reaches over to pat his chest lightly. "Don't worry. I'll just tell her I brought home a vagrant."

 

 

This is what happens next:

It's been a month and a half since Dan's lapse in judgment and he's decided to forget it ever happened – a relatively easy thing to do, considering Carter took off for parts unknown not long after. Serena never said anything about it, so Dan can only assume Carter kept the whole thing to himself. As he should have.

So it's been almost two whole months and Dan is living in semi-blissful heterosexuality, though the only girl he's actually had sex with in that time is Serena, and most of that was her taking pity on him. He's out with her tonight – her and Nate and Nate's sort of girlfriend Autumn and Blair and Blair's stockbroker boyfriend Sean. It's not entirely terrible, despite Dan's mixed feelings about Sean's existence in all of their lives; in fact, it's a pretty nice night.

The bar is crowded and dark and loud like bars are but Dan is just intoxicated enough not to mind. He goes up to get the next round, trying not to lose patience with the throng of jostling young professionals, when he feels someone step up close behind him. Like, too close. A distinct personal bubble violation. And then a familiar voice in his ear purrs, "I want to suck you off." A pause. "Interested?"

Dan instantly remembers everything he'd pretended to forget. 

Dan definitely does not lean back into Carter, despite how appealing the idea is, and definitely _doesn't_ heat up when Carter's hand curls around his hip. It's just hot in the bar and hotter here and when did Dan get so gay, again? 

It's a good thing the crowd is blocking them from view. Dan turns his head slightly. "Here?"

Carter grins like he's impressed but says, "How far's your place?"

They stay for another forty minutes so as not to raise any eyebrows. Dan watches Carter flirt with both Nate and Serena while simultaneously acting as though he and Dan have never so much as shaken hands. It's both gratifying and irritating. 

Carter leaves first and Dan fifteen minutes later. No one looks suspicious except Blair. Maybe not suspicious – curious. Her eyes follow him all the way out the door, the back of his neck prickling under her gaze.

The bar is only a few blocks from Dan's apartment, a Lower East Side walk-up that he used to share with his ex-girlfriend Jane and can't really pay for on his own much longer. He'd like to migrate back to Brooklyn (if only to force his friends to go to Brooklyn) but moving depends on him ever selling another book, which seems unlikely these days.

Carter is waiting outside the building, a slim, black-clad figure against the red bricks with cigarette smoke obscuring his face. It's an undeniably good look for him. Carter has that effortlessly cool thing going that Dan still hasn't quite figured out. He makes himself walk over at a normal pace, since sprinting headfirst into a blowjob would not be his finest moment.

"Didn't mean to keep you waiting." Dan's keys are already in his hands; momentum is carrying him right past Carter and to the door of the building to unlock it.

Carter flicks his cigarette away and pushes off the wall. "Builds anticipation."

Unfortunately there isn't much time for sexy banter while rushing up a five-floor walk-up, and Dan is winded by the time they get to his door. He drops his keys twice, entire body on that too-eager knife-edge, making his movements awkward and stilted. 

"Doing this once is fun, but twice is probably a pattern, right?" Dan jokes while he fiddles idiotically with the lock.

Carter steps up behind him, apparently undeterred by Dan's sudden turn into a complete doofus. His lips press against the back of Dan's neck, hands coming around to Dan's belt buckle. "Do you want some platitudes to bring you off the ledge, or should I just –" His fingers are deftly undoing Dan's jeans before slipping shamelessly into his briefs. "Distract you from the sexuality analysis?"

"Jesus." Dan's eyes close and he bites his lip. "I have neighbors."

"Then you better get that door open quick, huh?" Carter says, stroking slow and firm like he doesn't have a care in the world. He probably doesn't. What an asshole.

The lock finally clicks and they're inside, door slamming shut behind them and Carter shoving Dan up against it. His hands roam over Dan's chest, knuckles rubbing over his nipples through his shirt. Then Carter sinks to his knees.

Carter tugs Dan's jeans and boxers down roughly before grabbing Dan by the hips to haul him forward a little, Dan's shoulders still flat to the wall. Carter gets one hand around Dan's cock again, stroking fast until Dan is hard, breathless. He couldn't look away from Carter even if he wanted to. His body is tense, attuned, waiting; Carter wets his lips and Dan sucks in a breath. Carter grins a little, glancing up.

"What did I say? _Easy_." And then his lips close around Dan.

Now that sex with Carter is apparently something Dan does, he's starting to get a handle on how Carter operates. He is not a time-waster, that much is certain, and not someone who shies away from stating what they want. For a bullshit artist, he doesn't seem to have much time for bullshit. And he reads Dan too well, or maybe it's just that their sexual interests align. Carter knows what he's doing and does it with the kind of expertise born of combined skill and enthusiasm. 

It's pretty great, from where Dan's standing. Still morally fucked, but nevertheless pretty great.

There's no buildup, no easing into it: Carter is fast and unrelenting, mouth meeting the hand curled around Dan's dick over and over without pause. With every slide of his lips, he takes a little more, lets it go a little deeper, until his hand flattens against Dan's stomach and his lips touch the base of Dan's cock. Dan isn't even doing a damn thing but he can't seem to catch his breath, scratching at the wall behind him.

"Fuck," Dan breathes, end of it twisting into a groan. That seems to be the only word he's capable of saying, a soft repetition that speeds up when Carter does, gets plaintive every time it's just too much. It's the only sound in the apartment besides Carter's breathing, heavy through his nose. 

Dan can't stop watching Carter but still gives a little start when Carter meets his gaze, upturned eyes very blue, all on-purpose faux-innocence. He hums a little around Dan's dick, and that's enough to rouse another sharply helpless _fuck_. Which seems to amuse Carter to no end.

It's then Dan notices that Carter's got his left hand on himself through his jeans. He realizes dumbly that he hasn't even really _seen_ Carter's cock, because Dan has been the focus thus far, arranged and fucked with little active participation. He wants to see Carter, suddenly and acutely. He wants to touch Carter, wants to taste him, wants Carter between his lips.

"Should've – bed," is all he's able to get out before he has to squeeze his eyes shut and think of England lest the thought take him over the edge. It doesn't help much since he can see it all too clearly in his mind: Carter's mouth on him while his mouth is on Carter, both of them at once.

Carter pulls off briefly to say, "No time," with a painfully hot, hoarse voice. Then he's back at it, only this time he's encouraging Dan with a touch to move his hips, to thrust. A part of Dan kind of fractures and loses it, but the rest of him keeps it together; with one hand on the wall for balance and the other gripping Carter's hair tightly, he lets his dick slide in and out of Carter's wet, flushed lips. Carter lets him set the pace, lets him do what he wants, and he realizes belatedly that Carter has ceded some control only so he can start to jerk off. 

"Fuck, fuck, _fuck_ ," Dan moans.

Carter comes first, spilling into his hand with a groan Dan can _feel_ , not as distinctly as the humming but much more viscerally. Then he slams Dan back against the wall once again, holding his hips down as he takes him deep – and Dan is absolutely a goner, Dan comes like he's been jolted out of his skin.

Carter wipes his mouth before pulling himself to standing with a handful of Dan's shirt. He's very close again, their bodies pressed together, and once more Dan is very aware of being half-dressed and wrecked whereas Carter is already zipped up like nothing even happened. 

"I wanted to do you," Dan murmurs. 

"Not sure you would've had the strength," Carter jokes. "I seem to send you to pieces."

Dan is indeed exhausted, but he still says, "Delusions of grandeur. I could suck fifty dicks right now."

Carter half-smiles with something that might be legitimate warmth before he bends to press a slow kiss to the very center of Dan's throat, right below his Adam's apple. "Maybe you can prove it to me sometime," he murmurs, and then drops another kiss to Dan's cheek. "See you around, handsome."

"What? Already?" Dan's saying, but Carter's gone in a blink, door closing on him while Dan catches his breath, tugging his jeans back up.

His cat hops onto the table next to him and licks her paws, looking at Dan judgmentally. 

"I know, I know," he says. "I have no idea what I'm doing."

 

 

Two weeks later, in the middle of the night, Dan's buzzer goes. 

"It's a tall, dark stranger," comes the low rumble of Carter's voice. "Who wants to stick it in you."

"You're a regular Casanova," Dan says, and buzzes him up.

 

 

After a few weeks of radio silence and unreturned texts, Dan finds out from Serena that Carter has gone to Buenos Aires. It explains everything but is also immensely frustrating. 

Dan is aware that fucking a few times does not mean Carter owes him anything, but he still thinks a once-every-few-weeks booty call deserves a little heads-up about out of town trips. It's just polite. Dan could really use the tension release this week, with his office job boring him out of his brain and his bookstore job more stressful than it rightly should be – and all those chapters he just doesn't have it in him to write. 

It doesn't help that on Friday night Dan arrives at the bar to find both Serena and Nate have flaked, consigning Dan to an evening with Blair and her goddamn boyfriend. 

Sean doesn't care for Dan because Dan is a total asshole to him pretty much all the time. He can't help it. Sean is just the kind of guy that it's impossible not to dislike because he's basically perfect, a robot made in a lab specifically for girls like Blair Waldorf. 

Sean is four years older, a graduate of both Harvard and Stanford with degrees in business and finance. Blair met him through one of Nate's cousins; apparently Sean's family used to summer with them in Europe. He's filthy rich all on his own, not that it matters considering he's got an entire clan of filthy rich relatives WASPing around over in Connecticut.

Not to mention Sean is polite, thoughtful, good-looking, and athletic. He volunteers with underprivileged children in his spare time. His favorite hobby is kayaking. He spent a year in the Peace Corps. Dan absolutely, unreservedly hates him.

Blair chides him for it the next afternoon when they have a late breakfast tucked together in her bed. No funny business – Saturday afternoon brunch-in-bed is just a thing they do sometimes, a totally normal friend-thing that definitely doesn't mean anything at all.

"You're being ridiculous," Blair says. She leans against him, Dan's arm around her, with her eyes on the television across the way. Today it's Barbara Stanwyck in _The Lady Eve_. "You never like any of my boyfriends."

The hand holding her coffee cup rests on Dan's stomach; he can feel the heat of it through his shirt. "You never like my girlfriends," he points out.

"That's because you have abysmal taste," Blair says. "Serena excepted." 

Amused, Dan says, "I thought you didn't approve of that?"

"Sleeping with your high school girlfriend when you're sad isn't exactly the definition of healthy."

"Nope," Dan agrees. "But it sure is fun."

Blair shifts a little so she can lean more comfortably into his chest. "You're seeing someone now, though, aren't you?"

Dan pauses, and then laughs. "Why do you say that?"

"Because I'm not stupid," Blair says. "She's obviously someone you're too ashamed to even tell your friends about."

Dan takes her coffee from her so he can have a stalling sip. "Who's to say I'm not ashamed of you guys?"

Blair snorts, very ladylike, and stretches luxuriously like a cat about to pounce. Her pale pink robe slips from her shoulders. "Don't be ridiculous."

There are moments when Dan is sort of stupidly suffused with affection for Blair, but he tries to stamp it down and not, like, gaze at her or anything. "You intimidate them all, anyway. Do you know what Janie used to say about you?"

"'I wish I was as charming and stylish as Blair'?" she asks innocently. 

"Funnily enough, no," Dan says. Jane actually had a lot to say on the topic of Blair, and Dan's relationship with Blair, and none of it was very complimentary. "She used to say, and I quote, 'the fact that you're friends with a girl like that makes me seriously wonder about you.'"

It's not unlike something Dan himself thought, once upon a time.

"There are plenty of things to wonder about with you, but I'm not sure how _that's_ one of them," Blair says. 

Dan's retort is cut off by the sound of his phone. It takes him a minute to find it in the fluffs of Blair's duvet and when he does, he sees it's a text from a number he doesn't know. It reads simply: _I'm in town_.

 _Ominous_ , Dan types back, trying to ignore the shiver of anticipation that slides down his spine.

"Who is it?" Blair demands, sitting up a little. "Is it your new girl?"

" _No_ ," Dan says, exasperated, and it's at least truth-adjacent. He puts the phone out of reach so she doesn't grab it. "And even if it _was_ , you are aware that I'm a grownup and I don't need you to _approve_ of the things I do, right?"

"You wouldn't if you could make appropriate choices," Blair shoots back. Which, point.

 

 

Dan had anticipated Carter showing up in the vicinity of two a.m. again, so he's surprised when the buzzer goes while he's in the middle of making dinner. He leaves the door unlocked before returning to his food. It's not long before there are footsteps in the hallway, and then a gentle knock. 

"Why, honey, you shouldn't have." Carter lets the door shut before leaning back against it, eyes travelling first over the pan on the stove, then slowly over the rest of the apartment, expression neutral. Dan's apartment is a one-bedroom with a joke of a kitchen tucked into a corner of the living room. It's not the greatest, especially compared to where Dan grew up, but it had been nice, once, when he lived here with someone else. It had been homier then. 

It's also got some pretty boss exposed brick. 

Dan smiles, looking over at him. "As far as you're concerned, I didn't."

"Cute," Carter says as he drifts over. "Real cute." He nods his head towards the food. "So what's going on here?"

"This?" Dan says, "This here is what we call an omelette, the meal of choice for single people with no cooking skills."

Carter whistles low, hand coming up to rest companionably between Dan's shoulder blades. "Fancy. Never knew you were such a chef, Humphrey."

"To be fair, you know next to nothing about me as a person."

"Know some things," he says cheekily, and takes that as an opportunity to give Dan a good grope.

"Wow," Dan says with a sideways glance, "That was stunningly cheesy. That was bad. I was made to understand you had some kind of reputation for seducing people."

"I seduced you alright the first time," Carter says in that low, idle tone he has that really does it for Dan, reluctant as he is to admit it. "Gave it up in under fifteen minutes. I should be able to coast on that for a while, no?"

His hand has begun to move up and down the length of Dan's back in an absentminded way that is probably anything but. 

"I don't know," Dan says slowly. "It's not like you exactly lived up to your promises that first time."

He gives Dan's hair a sharp chiding tug before his hand resumes its path. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Dan doesn't look up. "I've had better."

Carter is silent for a moment, absorbing this, and then he says, "Sounds like a challenge to me."

"Good," Dan says, turning, "Because it was."

Against the counter Dan goes, using what will hopefully be the last shred of his rational mind to turn the stove off first. The drawer pull digs sharply into Dan's lower back. He truly could not care less.

Carter's pressed up against him, hands under Dan's shirt skimming over his skin before the shirt is tugged off, tossed away. They're both pretty impatient every time they end up doing this, and it's all yanking at zippers, kicking away clothes. Last time Dan had finally gotten Carter completely out of his, though admittedly it'd been too dark to really enjoy the view. 

The view is not something he would have anticipated wanting to enjoy a few months ago, but times have clearly changed. Case in point: Dan pushing Carter the few feet back onto the couch and getting on the floor between his legs. He uses the position to get a little perspective.

Carter naked is pretty great, biceps and abs and all that stuff. Dan likes Carter's body, the width of his shoulders, his muscular arms, his cock – it's not one to write home about, perfectly average, but Dan's finding it hard to express his increasingly positive feelings about it without resorting to bad puns and –

"What the fuck," he says, trying very hard to keep the burgeoning laughter from his voice, "is that."

There is a tattoo on Carter's hip. It is all in black, a tiger or panther or something with a slightly smushed face and a too-long tail whipping around Carter's side to his back. Dan does not understand how he has not noticed it before this moment. 

Carter looks down, rolling his eyes. "Cautionary tale," he says dryly. "Decision of a high nineteen year old."

"Do you identify with panthers?" Dan asks and, no longer able to stifle the laughter, turns his face into Carter's knee to hide it. "Do you feel they represent you personally?"

Offended, Carter says, "It's clearly a mountain lion."

And Dan loses it all over again.

It appears Carter likes Dan's body too, though Dan is not going to question the whys of it. He looks fine, he knows that; he knows who and what he is, knows the skinny hipster thing works for some people. Carter apparently does not discriminate. But whenever Dan's fucking someone new he thinks of that one time when he actually thought he looked good, his freshman year when he went to the gym and everything. He always thinks _you should know one time I looked better than this_. But that's insecurity talking, and these days Dan tries not to give much weight to it. It can just be difficult in moments like this, kneeling in front of some dude preparing to give the first blowjob of his young life. 

"Here's a tip," Carter says, thumb pressing gently into the hinge of Dan's jaw. "Contrary to the name, you suck, don't blow."

"Where'd you find that joke, 1995?" 

Blowjobs are weird. Not _weird_ weird, just – Dan likes them, obviously, in terms of getting them or looking at them in porn, but putting a dick in his own mouth is definitely weird. He has a split second of confusion when he does it, like, why did he make this choice? Why did he want to do this again? This thing he has no experience doing, that's awkward and unwieldy and –

"Teeth," Carter hisses.

Dan always liked going down on girls. He liked the way they felt and how they tasted, liked having that slick flesh under his tongue. He liked figuring out what each girl wanted and how they were different. But more than that it was just simple physical sensation: making women wet, teasing out their shivers, making them come. 

Even thinking about it makes him a little more enthusiastic about sucking Carter's dick.

But after a while it's just, well, repetitive. There isn't exactly much to do except play chicken with his gag reflex and hope he doesn't look like a total idiot. He's certainly got nothing on Carter in this department.

He finally pulls off, looking up at Carter with an unimpressed expression. "This is fucking exhausting."

It's then that he notices Carter has a patchy flush crawling up his tan chest, which is rising and falling rapidly with his breathing. Interesting. 

"You need practice," Carter says. "I volunteer to help with that." 

"I'll bet."

Carter gives him a lazy grin, gaze flicking over Dan's face and down his body, lingering at his mouth and lower. "You wanna get fucked, you better go get ready."

"Sort of did already," Dan says, though he still starts to stand, because lube and condoms and all that jazz. Carter's got that interested look on his face, like Dan is a pet picking up new tricks all on its own. "You gonna call me easy again?"

"I like easy." Carter shifts forward, hands sliding over Dan's hips, thumbs rubbing over his hipbones. "Never was the kind of guy who got off on a challenge." His fingers roam over Dan's ass. He kisses Dan's stomach. "What do you like?"

Fidgeting just slightly under the attention, Dan says, "I'd like you to hold on five seconds," before he goes to get everything they'll need. He returns to find Carter rather impassively stroking his dick, looking contemplative. 

"Come here," he says.

"Kind of the plan," Dan answers, but Carter doesn't just mean here as in _closer_ , he means here as in _sit in my lap_. Which Dan does, knees tucked on either side of Carter's hips, dick coming suddenly very much to attention despite the somewhat awkward position.

"What is it?"

Dan sets his hands lightly on Carter's shoulders, feeling an answering touch at the base of his spine. "I don't know," he says. "I don't think I've ever sat in someone's lap before."

Carter sits up a little since Dan is leaning away, his lips finding freckles on Dan's chest. "Do you not like it?"

Every little movement brings Carter torturously into contact, never enough to be satisfying but just enough to tease. "I don't hate it."

In response Carter hums a little with his mouth on Dan's skin. Then he says, "It doesn't make you submissive or anything," with one of those annoying little bits of insight he has, "But it's fine if you are, too."

Dryly, Dan says, "Thank you for this after school special moment of learning to accept sexual peculiarities." 

"Never saw that one," Carter remarks. 

"I don't think that. About myself."

"If you did, then." Having found the bottle of lubricant, Carter is now rubbing slick fingers gently against Dan. "You didn't answer my question, you know."

"Which was?"

"What you like. What you want."

"Uh." Dan feels kind of sheepish answering questions like this, especially with someone's fingers practically in him; that aside, clear statements of desire have a way of making one feel self-conscious. "You could be…meaner."

Carter shifts a little and then his hand tangles in Dan's hair, yanks back hard. His mouth leaves a wet trail over Dan's bared throat. "I sort of figured," he says. "Your boner for Blair Waldorf could be seen from space."

"We're just friends," Dan protests, something he finds himself protesting often, but also it's hard to focus as he rocks back against Carter's hand. He's still not sure he likes himself like this. 

Then Carter gives his hair another sharp, nasty pull that Dan hadn't been expecting, and he bears down keenly on the fingers pressing inside him.

"Oh, honey," Carter says, lips curling into a smile against Dan's chest. "You got a real _thing_ , huh?"

"Shut up," Dan mutters. Carter bites his collarbone pointedly. 

Carter gives him a break from questions as he works his fingers into Dan until they reach the joint decision that it's enough. _It was enough five minutes ago_ , Dan wants to say but doesn't, still unable to articulate anything that might correlate to ¬– If he said that he wouldn't mind it a little rougher, what would that make him?

Carter telegraphs all his intentions very clearly, giving Dan little wordless touches and signals to get him to move whichever way so Carter can slide into him finally, a slow drag of heated skin that they both relish. But once inside Dan, Carter stills, removes his hands, and focuses on Dan very, very intently. Firmly, Carter says, "Here's what you're gonna do: whatever you want."

He's slouched down further on the couch now, hands resting casually on the cushions and watching Dan with those hazy eyes.

On the tip of Dan's tongue is _I want you to get on with it already_ but that isn't what Carter means. This has to do with that accept-your-sex-weirdness stuff from before; it has to do with Dan not being able to ask for what he wants. There's definitely an added helping of Carter generally being an asshole, trying to rouse reactions from Dan for some unforeseeable end. 

But maybe it's something else too, if the patient expression on Carter's face is anything to go by. Maybe he's trying to give Dan a little bit of navigation in this messy thing they've started. Maybe he's trying to help Dan steer. 

Dan takes a deep breath. Do whatever you want to do.

What he does first is put his hands flat on Carter's chest, all that waiting muscle under his palms, and readjust the position of his knees. He can feel Carter so much more like this. He can feel Carter so deeply. 

"It's all you, babe," Carter says, voice low. What an asshole.

At first Dan feels kind of, well…slutty, grinding down, guiding himself on Carter. He's not sure when exactly it changes from ridiculous to too-hot-to-give-a-fuck, he only knows his head drops back, his breathing shifts, and he stops caring. He stops caring what Carter thinks of him and how Carter's seeing him and what he probably looks like; he knows what he _feels_ like, split and full and feverish. 

Like he can't help himself, Carter starts to rub his hands over Dan's skin: up and down his thighs, over his waist and his chest. "I remember what an uptight little thing you used to be," he breathes. "In your little vests. So uncomfortable. So angry. God, if I'd only thought of it, I'd have fucked you then."

Dan snorts. There's a burn in his thighs as he drives onto Carter. "My head would have exploded at the thought."

"That's what makes it so good." His arms go around Dan, giving up his feigned indifference. "You surprising yourself. Wanting it anyway."

"Thought you didn't like a challenge?" Dan takes Carter by the wrist to redirect his attention to his dick. Then he pushes Carter away, back against the couch. "The Dan of ten years ago would have never done this."

"Then I guess I'm awfully lucky right now." His hand moves over Dan's cock quick and skillful, but he otherwise heeds Dan's implied order not to move. Even his hips don't shift up against Dan. "Definitely should've tried to get Serena to have a threeway, though."

Despite himself, Dan laughs. "Yeah, that would've gone over real well."

Carter grins at him. "You never know. Can you picture it?" His hands coast over Dan's arms, which are still keeping him pinned back. He moves Dan's hands a little closer to his throat, soft and relaxed under the press of Dan's thumbs. 

"Had one once." Dan's eyes close, not because the memory of it is so great but because it's becoming more difficult to talk and do this at the same time. Carter's thrusting now, but lazily, and his hold on Dan's hips is loose. It's enough. It's all _just_ enough, that sweet impatient feeling seeming endless. Dan feels Carter's throat work under his hands. "Aftermath wasn't so great."

"That's why I like to leave the country after."

"Yeah, I noticed."

Carter laughs. His hand wraps around Dan's cock again, like a reward for being amusing. "Came back, though, didn't I, honey?"

Dan considers just covering Carter's mouth to put an end to the commentary. He wonders if that's how people usually feel with him in bed. Huh. "I realize the irony, but –" He shifts restlessly in Carter's lap and flexes the fingers on Carter's neck. "Stop talking, maybe?"

Carter leans into Dan's touch slightly too hard, speeds up his strokes as he tilts to kiss the underside of Dan's jaw. He murmurs, "You know what I think, Dan? I think what you really want is someone to play tender, not rough."

Dan's grip on his throat is steady. "Oh?"

"Mm." Carter's teeth are at the space below Dan's ear. "I could play good for you. Haven't I been good? I could be so goddamn sweet it'd shatter you. You'd be a mess. No idea what to do with yourself."

Dan wants him to stop but also, obviously, does not. They're moving together harder now, more forcefully, seeking an end; it's close, Dan can practically taste how close it is. "You seem to like telling me what I want."

"Got a bad habit for pushing buttons," he says. 

"Pretend I made a sex pun."

Carter smirks even as his thumb swipes insistently over the head of Dan's dick until a sharp sound reverberates somewhere in Dan's throat. The blue of his eyes seems cooler, gray-toned almost, in the light of Dan's apartment and he's waiting, body tensed beneath Dan. Dan can't seem to pull his gaze from Carter, riding his dick in time with Carter jerking him off, and then Carter wets his lips and Dan comes like skipping a step, missing a beat of his pulse. One minute he isn't anywhere near close enough and the next he's a goner, come streaking white over Carter's stomach. 

He releases Carter's throat, finally, as that post-orgasm prickly haze descends. Then Carter runs a finger through the mess on his skin and brings it to his mouth to taste; Dan's entire exhausted body tries so hard to react to that, but all he manages to do is bear down on Carter with whatever remaining energy he's got, setting off that orgasm like a flame to kindling.

Dan slumps over to the side, breathing hard, face mashed into Carter's shoulder. "You are too good at that."

"I know," Carter says in a voice both unbothered and self-satisfied. He tilts to meet Dan's half-closed eyes. "I did porn one time."

Dan snorts. "Color me unsurprised."

"Are you trying to imply something about me, Humphrey?" Carter's voice is even nicer to listen to in the aftermath; that way he has of slurring his syllables just slightly is immensely soothing to Dan's muddled brain. "If you were trying to imply I'm a promiscuous fuck-up with issues, well. You'd be pretty much on point."

Dan kisses Carter's shoulder. "I really was not. And that is actually kind of very sad." Serena had a way of doing that too: tossing off very sad things very casually, as though they were nothing at all. 

"I know," Carter says, still looking at him. "Beneath this charming, sexy exterior I have a secret wealth of pain."

Dan's lips twist into a little bit of a smile and he brings a hand up to touch Carter's mouth, the smooth bow shape naturally downturned at the corners. Then he kisses Carter, tired and unthinking.

But almost immediately he pulls back. "That was… Have we not done that before? Have we not kissed before just now?"

Carter takes a long moment to think about it, brow furrowed. "Might not've." 

Kissing is generally a big deal for Dan. Girlfriends have poked well-meaning fun at him about it, but he can't help it, he just really likes to kiss. So even though Carter is Carter, it is distinctly unlike Dan to have had a whole lot of sex with someone without kissing them once.

So Dan leans in to kiss him again, to make up for lost time.

Carter kisses like he does everything else in bed: forceful but just the right side of pushy, directing but not demanding. And filthy, too – Carter doesn't bother teasing, just gives it all he's got, open-mouthed, messy, filthy kissing.

He's just slipping Dan some tongue when a sharp pain in Dan's leg makes him jump, and he looks down to see the cat innocently flexing her claws on him. She meows and then kneads his skin again, needle-sharp. 

"Someone wants attention," Carter says.

The cat is named Sylvia. She's all white with blue eyes, a small pink nose, and the weighty judgmental stare of all cats. She had been a gift for Blair originally, until Blair decided litter boxes were simply too repulsive and gave her back. She's still technically Blair's cat, really, only she lives here. Dan explains all this to Carter, who has reached over to scratch behind Sylvia's ears, receiving an amused and knowing look in response.

"What?" 

"'Just friends,' was it?" Carter replies. He scoops Sylvia up one-handed, but Dan intervenes and sets her back on the floor. Carter raises an eyebrow.

"You're naked, it's weird," Dan says with a fidgety shrug. They're both a bit of a mess, drying sweat and sex hair and…other things. Dan averts his gaze from Carter's stomach and stands. "I need to shower. You are, uh, of course welcome to also."

The amusement in Carter's expression only grows as he watches Dan from his comfortable sprawl. "Thanks, handsome."

Dan's own stomach gives a pitiful rumble as he moves towards the bathroom, reminding him that he never had dinner, and he gives his ruined omelette a pathetic, longing look. He'll have to figure something out once Carter leaves, which Dan assumes will be before his shower is over. 

So he's a little surprised when Carter pulls back the shower curtain and hops in with him. "Won't be but a minute," he says with a quick grin, and it's the best kind of lie; Carter uses every excuse to get his hands on Dan, then makes out with him until the hot water is used up, then exits – leaving Dan to a cold shower he doesn't even have it in him to complain about.

Dan expects Carter to be gone by the time he's dressed but he's sitting on the couch in his jeans, on his phone, hair wet. Sylvia, traitor that she is, is a faintly purring fluffy white loaf on Carter's chest. _Harper_ is playing on the television. 

Dan is not quite sure what's going on here, but it sounds like Carter is ordering Indian food and Dan really does love Indian food. Once Carter hangs up, Dan asks doubtfully, "You watch movies?" 

"Mm," Carter answers. "I also eat, breathe, walk, and talk. Just like a real boy."

Dan snorts as he drops onto the couch. "You're not as bad as I thought," he says. "You're actually sort of alright."

"High praise indeed." Companionably, Carter toys with the curls at the nape of Dan's neck. "Low expectations are easy to exceed. If you really cared about me, I'd be pretty disappointing, I promise." 

"Oh, Bruce," Dan says, "It must be so hard being Batman."

Carter thwacks him upside the head.

 

 

And then this happens:

Blair throws brunches semi-regularly, as though they don't all see enough of each other as it is, and they put up with it because whatever her other faults might be, she can really throw together a menu. And when squinting through a hangover on Sundays, as most of them usually are, good food is a definite necessity.

Carter arrives arm-in-arm with Serena, and it strikes Dan (not for the first time) that they are at-ease with each other in a way neither of them are with anyone else, a kind of camaraderie over a decade in the making. Today, for whatever reason, Dan is faintly, irrationally annoyed by it – until Carter takes the seat next to him at the table and proves himself more interested in tracing Dan's inseam than following the conversation.

Carter cleans up real nice when he wants to; today is no exception. That's probably one of the few reasons Blair is only slightly huffy about his attendance: he's showed up looking every inch the good son of a prominent family, no hint of the trustafarian in sight. He shaved, put product in his hair, dressed in a pale gray button down and slacks – a change from his usual scruff and thrift-store pullovers. He looks good either way, but today there is a clean handsomeness to him that puts Dan's teeth on edge. 

"– which is why Dorota isn't here, which is so unfair of her, really –"

"Yeah, B, how dare she want to spend time with her family," Serena teases. 

Blair rolls her eyes good-naturedly. "Well, if the service is awful today, that's why."

"You know normal twenty-somethings don't have maid service at their brunches," Dan points out. "And the distance from here to your kitchen is like. Five feet."

"Life lessons from boy who grew up in a million-dollar loft."

"Without maid service," Nate chimes in helpfully. 

"Since you're such a normal twenty-something, Humphrey –" Blair starts, and he doesn't even need her to finish that sentence.

"I feel like I need to remind everyone that I was a cater-waiter for like two weeks," Dan says. "I don't understand why I can't shake this." 

"You're just awfully good at carrying plates," Blair says, giving him a mocking and overly sweet flutter of the lashes that does sort of work on him.

"And you make the best coffee!" Serena adds brightly. 

So he goes into the kitchen to make the coffee and get the next round of goodies. He doesn't mind it, honestly; for all that the girls tease him, especially Blair, they're pretty good at taking their turns on the chore wheel. Well, Serena is. Blair's getting better. 

After a few minutes the door to the kitchen pushes in, though Dan doesn't turn to see who it is, busy transferring tiny desserts to a tray. As soon as hands settle on his hips, he knows.

"No," Dan says. "Not at Blair's."

"You don't even know what I was gonna say," Carter protests. He pauses. "What about in the bathroom? Bathrooms are neutral territory."

"Nope, not fucking you in Blair Waldorf's bathroom."

"Just a handie?"

"You are the worst."

He bites the back of Dan's neck lightly and growls a little. "Come on… I need something more exciting than a mimosa to get me through anecdotes of Sean saving starving Dickensian orphans or whatever he does."

Dan continues to plate the pastries. "I see what you're doing there, but no: you will not be able to manipulate my hatred of Sean into sex for you."

Carter harrumphs a little before slipping directly into the space between Dan and the counter, carelessly interrupting Dan, who still has a tiny tartlet waiting in his hand. Carter leans forward to take a bite of it, leaving a little smudge of whipped cream on his top lip. 

"You can give up the act," Carter says. "I can tell you're totally charmed."

"You are mind-bogglingly arrogant," Dan tells him. But he kisses Carter anyway.

There's the quickness of Carter's grin against his mouth before the kiss deepens, Dan dropping the tart so he can curl his fingers in Carter's oh-so-neat hair. Carter's hands slide up over his sides and down into the back pockets of his jeans. Dan is internally debating the neutrality of bathrooms – the desire to mess up Carter's good boy act is strong ¬– when he hears a soft, muffled sound behind them. 

A soft, muffled, amused sound.

Dan thinks it'll be one of them, come to help – Serena maybe, or Sean, glad to see Dan probably won't steal his girlfriend after all. But it isn't one of them. It's _all_ of them.

Both Serena and Nate are stifling laughter; Autumn is just a pair of eyes peeking over Nate's shoulder like she doesn't know what she's supposed to do; Sean looks, if anything, relieved; and Blair has the scrunched up expression of a person who just stepped in dog poo.

"In _my kitchen_?" Blair says. 

"It's not like you use it for anything," Dan retorts automatically, which is probably not what one should say upon being caught fooling around in a friend's home. "Also, sorry."

Carter's hands are still on his ass, apparently without any intention at all of moving. Wait, Dan was wrong – one hand slides up the back of his t-shirt. 

"Has this been going on _long_?" Blair demands. 

"Hon," Sean says, touching her waist lightly. "Maybe you should let Dan tell you in his own time, when he's comfortable."

Dan rolls his eyes so hard he thinks he might've strained something. Carter pinches him.

"Ooh," Serena realizes, "Did this happen that time you were at my place, because I thought it was really weird that Carter did laundry –"

"Oh my god, ew." Blair looks like she just sucked on a lemon. "You people are hedonists." 

Dan stares at her. "Who calls someone a hedonist in 2015?" 

"If the shoe fits," Carter says. "I have basically fucked everyone in this room." He gives Autumn a wink. "'Cept you, sweetheart."

"Hey, hey, hey." Nate frowns. "Stop that. And we didn't have _sex_ , exactly."

"Neither did we," Sean says. "Just pointing that out for the sake of accuracy." 

"Oh my god, Sean, no one cares," Dan snaps.

And that's how everyone finds out. 

 

 

Dan has to have a lot of conversations after that.

"It's casual," he explains to Blair – or tries to.

"The last time you were 'casual' with someone, you almost ended up _engaged_ to Nelly Yuki, most desperate woman in all Manhattan," Blair says. Before he can respond, she holds up a hand. "And I swear to God if you try to deny it, I will be scratching the drapes."

Grinning, Dan says, "Aw, now don't be mean about Nelly. She's a good girl. You know, she gave shockingly good –"

"No," Blair practically hisses. "Please do not regale me with stories of the sexual prowess of my _nemesis_ , Humphrey."

Serena is thankfully less interested in scolding him over the whole thing, possibly because she finds it so hilarious. "I just don't get how this happened. I mean, _you_ and _Carter_. You are not a person who experiments. You're like one of those breeds of penguins who mate for life."

"To be fair," Dan says, "I made the decision very early in the morning."

Nate only wants to clarify that he did not, in fact, have sex with Carter. "It was like one blowjob," he says. "Totally doesn't count."

Dan fact-checks that with Carter, whose first response is a shrug as he flicks his cigarette towards the ashtray balanced on Dan's mattress; he has already gotten several burns in Dan's sheets. "Yeah. Sucked his dick once when we were teenagers." He pauses. "Well, _he_ was a teenager, at any rate."

Dan snorts, shaking his head. "You are one shady motherfucker."

Carter gives him a shit-eating grin. "You like it."

Worst part is, Dan does.

Carter shifts on the bed, slithering up next to Dan, who up until now has been lying on his stomach and attempting to get some writing done. "You know," Carter murmurs, low in Dan's ear, "I fucked Blair Waldorf too."

Dan's fingers stutter on the laptop keys, ending the sentence he'd been writing with a jumble of nonsense letters. "You did not," he says, even as he thinks back to the kitchen. Blair hadn't denied being among Carter's _everyone_. "When?"

"Oh, she had a bad girl phase for about two minutes… Being a bad man, I took advantage."

Dan's heart is suddenly thumping hard against his ribcage, something akin to betrayal swirling through him. But that's ridiculous. He has no reason to feel anything like that. Carter leans in to kiss Dan's neck below his ear, lips soft and hot.

"Want a play-by-play?"

" _No_ ," Dan huffs. "It's none of my business." 

"But you're curious."

He can feel Carter watching him, so he makes a point of resuming his typing, even if his brain is now essentially blank. "That doesn't make it my business." 

Fluid as anything, Carter pushes up and levers himself over Dan, settling on top of him. His mouth presses to the back of Dan's neck briefly. "Quick question: do you miss fucking girls?"

Dan shuts his laptop.

He doesn't even know how one goes about picking up a girl to have sex with oneself and one's shady hook-up, and he rejects asking Serena on grounds of feeling weird about it ("But she's great at threesomes," Carter tries.). Luckily for him his shady hook-up is Carter, and Carter knows all about finding random girls to have sex with. 

They go out for drinks, Dan a little anxious but trying to hide it. He excuses himself to the bathroom for a mere five minutes and by the time he returns, there is already a girl sitting at the table next to Carter and laughing at his jokes. It's that fast, blink and you'll miss it, and Dan would be suspicious of Carter's sweet-talking skills if he hadn't experienced them firsthand. 

Carter grins wide when he spots Dan. "Danny," he says, knowing Dan hates that, "Meet our new friend Marisol."

"Dan," Dan corrects, finding a smile as he reaches for her hand. "He knows I hate that."

Marisol is petite and strikingly pretty with dark hair swept back off her shoulders. She has a square-shaped face, strong jaw balancing out startlingly symmetrical features. When she smiles, shallow dimples crease her cheeks.

"How long have you two been together?" she asks.

Dan opens his mouth to say something snide but Carter gets there first. "Officially? Two months," he says, sliding an arm around Dan's shoulders. 

"Unofficially –" Dan starts.

"Matter of perspective," Carter says with a wink.

"You have absolutely got to cut it out with that winking shit," Dan says, and Marisol laughs.

She must be into the whole boyfriends thing, because Carter plays it up through a few more rounds of drinks. He's always been a man free with endearments but he levels _up_ in front of Marisol – it's all _honey_ this and _baby_ that, and even one or two skin-tingling _sweetheart_ s. It's not just that, either; the way he touches Dan becomes stupidly gentle, and Dan finds himself embarrassingly into it too. It's a warm hand curled around the back of his neck, a laughing kiss pressed to his cheek. He thinks of the time Carter promised he could be so tender it'd be shattering.

Eventually the evening winds down and Carter leans across the table, all low-voiced persuasion. "So what do you say, beautiful? Interested or not?"

Marisol's lips purse thoughtfully, gaze shifting between them, and then she shrugs, posture relaxing in the span of a breath. Her eyes almost seem to glitter. "Oh, what the hell. Might as well cross it off my bucket list."

Carter laughs. "Attagirl."

In the cab, Carter kisses her, his fingertips on the strong line of her jaw. He looks at Dan over the curve of her cheek, just blue eyes and a wry grin that softens against Marisol's mouth. Carter's hand pauses on her thigh, stroking back and forth, until she glances quickly at the back of the driver's head and bites her lip, gives Carter a murmured, "Go ahead."

So his hand skims higher, disappearing under the scalloped edge of her black skirt. She sucks in a very, very soft breath, shifting in her seat as Carter slowly drags her panties down until they tangle at her ankles and she kicks them away. Someone should probably retrieve them from the cab floor but Dan imagines they're all just too distracted.

"Give her a kiss, sweetheart," Carter says. 

"You're so bossy," Dan tells him, but he's already leaning in to do it. This is Dan's worst behavior in the back of a cab yet, but she tastes so sweet, like cherries and amaretto, that a little bad behavior feels almost warranted. Carter's fingers twist with his, tugging him away from Marisol to steal a kiss of his own; playing the possessive boyfriend, maybe. The cabdriver sighs, an exhausted huff. 

The car pulls over a few moments later, Carter and Marisol piling out first and leaving Dan to awkwardly pay the fare with a cringing "sorry?" They hightail it up all five flights, arriving breathless on the landing, Marisol resting against the wall with exaggerated exhaustion. 

"You guys need to invest in a building with an elevator," she says. She reaches out to grab a handful of Dan's shirt and haul him over, tilting her face up to kiss him. 

"That's what I'm always telling him," Carter says airily as he fishes Dan's keys out of his pocket, because Carter is always losing his own. 

Dan fixes his mouth on Marisol's throat, teeth gentle. "He's full of shit, you know."

She seems amused by that. "Who isn't?"

With a click and a sweep, the door opens, Carter reaching over to pull Marisol away from Dan and into the apartment. "You wanna know the truth? Dan and I actually share an ex-girlfriend. It's how we met."

Dan follows them in, watching as Carter peels the jacket from her shoulders and opens the buttons of her blouse one by one. "That's interesting," Marisol says, but she sounds both disinterested and doubtful. She plucks Carter's belt open, slides his zipper down, and slips her hand in.

Carter releases a soft, bitten-off moan. "God's honest. And you know what she told me?" He turns Marisol around and pulls her against his chest so they're both looking over in Dan's direction. "She told me Dan gave the best head she ever had in her life. How about that?"

Now Marisol seems a good deal more interested.

"'Course he's fucking terrible at it with guys," Carter continues. "Can't suck a dick worth a damn."

"I don't put in that much effort with you," Dan says. 

Carter smiles but hides it against Marisol's shoulder. "So, sweetheart," he says to her, and the back of Dan's neck prickles. "How do you want it?"

"I'll give him a shot." She tries to sound cavalier but it just comes off breathless, and her gaze keeps pulling to Dan's mouth. He gives her half a smile, drifting closer until he can get on his knees in front of her.

"I'll do my best," he says. 

Carter tugs her skirt up obligingly. Her panties are still forgotten somewhere in a New York City taxi, and Dan leans forward to part her with his tongue, deliberate and careful. He looks up and almost laughs to see both of them so intensely watching him, mirrored expressions of lip-biting anticipation. Carter has a hand tucked into the cup of her bra.

The pressure is on for Dan, what with Carter talking him up to the point of ridiculousness, but for once he doesn't feel out of his element. He may not be the best ever in this particular woman's life but this _is_ something he can do, and has done, well. He gives himself up to it, first just mapping her sensitive skin, a little cool from exposure but getting hotter. His lips move over her with purposeful softness, dropping kisses along her cunt like he would anywhere else, like he would kiss her mouth.

He chances a look up again and sees Marisol's eyes tightly closed, her head tipped back, Carter whispering in her ear. Whatever he's saying is probably doing half as much work as Dan is, but Dan isn't really interested in sharing the workload. He nips her thigh sharply to get her attention and then redoubles his efforts.

He focuses everything he's got on her previously ignored clit, sucking and licking and nibbling until he can feel her legs tense and tremble on either side of him. A hand is tight in his hair but it feels like Carter's hand, feels recognizable, and Dan is emboldened, strangely, by that. The angle's iffy but he sinks his tongue inside her as much as he reasonably can then sucks a messy kiss on the surrounding skin, slick and sharp – the taste of her is specifically _hers_ but holds something in common with other women, makes Dan realize just how much he likes this, missed this, wanted this. He's hard but it's a distant feeling, just the ticking of his heartbeat in his body and the pulse of hers against his tongue.

"I'm gonna –" Marisol gasps, but she's wriggling away instead of closer. "Not yet, not yet, I wanna save it."

"I think you're allowed more than one," Dan jokes, but dutifully sits back, raising a hand to wipe his mouth. Then he notices the way Carter's watching him and puts his hand back down.

Carter gives Marisol a nudge but he's still looking at Dan when he tells her, "Bedroom's through there, honey."

Dan rises as Carter reaches for him. "You'll just call anyone that, won't you." 

"You want me to save it just for you?" Carter holds Dan's face between his hands, sucks lightly on Dan's bottom lip, tastes Marisol on him. "Want to be the only one called sweet things?"

Dan doesn't know if they're still putting on the show for company, because Marisol is in the other room and, anyway, it doesn't feel very much like playing. Dan makes a low, noncommittal sound before kissing Carter, being kissed. 

"I can do that, sweetheart," Carter says, and Dan just wants him to shut up now, so the next kiss is harder, and so's the next after. They kiss until Carter bites Dan's mouth roughly, almost savagely, and it's that, or a combination of everything, that has Dan pressing so close they stumble as they stand there. It's single-minded and furious and Dan wants nothing more than to take Carter to bed, forgetting momentarily that there's another person waiting for them there.

Until she speaks. Marisol's voice floats in from the other room, doing her level best at beguiling: "Boys?" 

They have a good time with Marisol, who proves to be uninhibited and good-natured, so exactly what they were looking for that Dan is half-ready to write the entire night off as a fever dream. She leaves sometime in the early hours while they're sleeping, her name and number printed in liquid liner on Carter's bicep.

"God, what a girl," Carter says, admiring it. "Look at that, no smudges."

But Dan is still thinking of the night before, and, well – he's been fucking Carter exclusively for two entire months (officially) and he doesn't know if Carter's been with other people but he can't imagine how Carter could find the time since they're always together. Carter's always looking for a place to crash so he ends up sleeping at Dan's a lot, ordering in and staking claim to the spare toothbrush. Sometimes they even go out for dinner. And, once, to a movie.

Horrified, Dan wonders aloud, " _Am_ I your boyfriend?"

Carter looks up from the phone number on his arm, repulsed. "Dan, I'm comfortable, I don't wanna have to get up to puke."

Dan's tense shoulders relax fractionally. "But we are…friends, sort of?"

Carter considers this. "Sort of," he says finally. "Dick friends."

 

 

It's all a roundabout way of getting to this:

"Remember that time," Dan murmurs, face smushed against the nape of Carter's neck very early in the morning, "you said what I wanted was not to play rough?"

One thing Dan does like about Carter is he doesn't ever give Dan shit about what he likes in bed ( _who_ he likes is another story). If anything, he wants Dan to be more forthcoming; but on the whole, if Dan has something specific in mind, Carter endeavors to give it to him. 

Dan gets fidgety and doubtful anyway, as is his nature. "This is weird, right? Like, normal people don't pretend to be _nice_ during sex, they're just nice. Making an exception for the weird stuff is what's normal when you're normal."

Carter rolls his eyes. "You're talking yourself into a circle."

"Wow, never been accused of that before."

"I promise you, you are the most normal person I've ever taken to bed. Alright? You're so normal you're boring."

Dan's skin tingles all the way down to his fingertips whenever he thinks of his cheek being lightly touched, being called sweetheart. He doesn't know why. It's just something he wants. But he's afraid of it being cheesy – will Carter light candles, pour wine? Does he think Dan's after some kind of eighties Harlequin soft focus softcore extravaganza? 

It doesn't end up being a carefully planned thing; it just sort of hovers at the edge of consciousness until they're on the couch kissing because Carter thought Dan's movie choice was boring. And Carter pulls back a little, lips swollen and eyes dark, to murmur, "Now?"

At Dan's nod, they move into the other room. Neither of them bother flicking the light switch, leaving them in hazy mostly-darkness – a streetlamp outside filters conveniently over the dark blue of Dan's bedspread, where Carter deposits him before tugging his shirt off. Dan wets his lips, his hands pressed palm-down to the mattress, ready and waiting. 

Carter strips off the rest of his clothes before crawling up the bed to kiss Dan, tongue flicking past Dan's lips. "Lay back," Carter says, so Dan does, eyes falling closed as his head hits the pillow only to open moments later, staring up at the dark. Carter exists at the periphery of his vision, spreading open Dan's unbuttoned shirt and kissing his chest, a slow and direct line down his torso. 

He gets Dan out of his clothes with little participation on Dan's part. Instead Dan lets himself enjoy the sweep of Carter's hands over his skin, smoothing over his arms and hips, stroking his stomach. Everything feels hushed and singular. It all seems strangely innocuous, every little touch, so when Carter's lips close around Dan's cock, it's startling enough to wrest a gasp from him. He's still on top of the blankets and the air is cool, Carter's mouth the only distinct source of heat. 

He doesn't go down on Dan for long, just gets him going before moving up for a kiss, nudging his nose against Dan's before their lips meet. And Dan has a weird thought, which is: he trusts Carter. 

The thing with Marisol brought a few things home that Dan chose not to dwell on. Like the realization that even though he had missed being with women, he probably wouldn't have sought out the experience without Carter's prompting; he hadn't felt like there was something he was lacking. 

"Here, honey, shift over," Carter says. His voice, though soft, feels sudden and loud in the silence. Dan answers wordlessly, moving so Carter can pull the blankets up over them, making the space they share smaller, warmer, more intimate. Their legs tangle. Carter's arm is solid around Dan's waist, the other pillowed under Dan's head. His lips press breeze-light over Dan's cheek and his temple and his jaw before finding his mouth again. 

Dan realizes he hasn't spoken since maybe forty minutes ago, when they were still watching the movie and he was criticizing Carter's lack of taste. Carter had kissed him so he would stop talking, and it proved an effective technique. Carter is speaking now, low-voiced encouragements and stupid sex compliments, and then he mumbles, "What'd I do to get so lucky, huh, baby? Ending up here with you."

And for whatever reason, Dan just _can't_.

He turns his face away from Carter's mouth and then just sits up, reaching for the pull chain on the bedside lamp, which floods at least this corner of the room with light. But when even that is not enough, Dan slides out of bed, needing space with desperate suddenness. "Sorry, I'm sorry," he's saying, "I don't know what – I just need a minute or something –"

"Fine with me." There's nothing in Carter's tone to suggest he finds this odd, though he's watching Dan rather closely. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm just…" But Dan doesn't really know what's going on with him. He grabs a pair of sweats left draped over the back of his desk chair and pulls them on, then does the same with a discarded shirt he thinks is Carter's. "I'm sorry."

"No reason to be," Carter says easily. There's a beat and then he swings his legs over the side of the bed, reaching for his jeans. "Look, I think I'm gonna run down to the corner for some cigs, is that alright?"

Dan nods, releasing a relieved breath. A few minutes alone are just what he needs, even if he just uses them to berate himself. 

"Alright," Carter murmurs, a little to himself, and gives Dan a final look before leaving the room. 

He's gone for probably fifteen minutes all told, during which Dan feels increasingly dumb while he sits awkwardly on the bed, then the couch, waiting for the sound of the door. Sylvia threads herself through his ankles insistently but it makes him feel edgy instead of comforted. When Carter does return, cursing about the _fuckin' heat_ , it's with a six-pack and a bag of what smells like cheap, delicious burritos. 

"You don't drink." It comes out automatically, and is not at all what Dan intended to say. 

"Living vicariously through you." Carter levels him with a considering look, eyebrow slightly arched, but he apparently determines Dan isn't going to implode or anything, so he continues shuffling out of his jacket. "Hungry?"

"Stupid," Dan blurts, then elaborates, "I feel extremely stupid right now."

"Don't." Carter sets the bag and beers on the coffee table before taking a seat and turning on the TV. "My turn, and we're not watching more esoteric hipster garbage."

Dan stares at him. "Are we not going to talk about me royally freaking out for no reason?"

Carter returns the look. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"I don't know." Dan shifts uneasily in his seat. "I don’t know what's up with me."

Carter only shrugs. "You don't have to like every single thing we do together," he says. "You're not into it, we do something else. It's not a big deal. Now eat your fucking burrito before I give it to the cat."

"She wouldn't eat it, she has a very refined palate." It's a weak joke, but it makes Dan feel more like himself. 

That's how they end up spending the rest of the night, bickering over what to watch until Carter hides the remote under the couch cushions so Dan can't argue with him anymore. And Dan feels pretty normal, his shoulder pressed to Carter's, Carter's hand on his knee. He feels good.

 

 

"If you fall for Carter Baizen," Blair says, "I will actually lose it. I'm serious, Dan. I will _lose it_."

Dan rolls his eyes. "I'm not falling for anybody."

They're both a little boozy – not drunk by any stretch, but enough that everything is shiny and sweet. The breeze is nice on their summer-hot skin. Blair smiles at him in that private way she sometimes does, her hand resting on his cheek.

"Where's Patrick Bateman tonight?" he asks, and she laughs, giving his cheek a light smack before her fingertips go back to trailing over his stubble.

" _Sean_ is working late," Blair says. 

"He's so boring," Dan says. "Don't you think he's so boring? I mean, he's a _stockbroker_ , Jesus."

"A _financial advisor_ ," Blair corrects. "And his conversation is clever and always appropriate, which is more than I can say for you. But he isn't funny. I'll give you that."

Dan can't seem to stop tracing the line of her throat and collarbone, a strong wide V, over and over. There's a little bit of perspiration on her skin. Her shin rests against his, knee to ankle. 

"How's he feel about you flirting with your friends?" Dan asks pointedly, raising an eyebrow.

She smiles again. "He probably wouldn't like it," she allows. "But he thinks you're gay, so."

"You sleep with one of your friend's exes…" Dan says with a mock-put-upon sigh. 

"I still can't believe you," she says. "You never do anything this interesting. Or this…" Her gaze sweeps up and down before she decides on, "Innovative." 

"Yeah, well, how would you know?" Dan says. "You've never had me."

He can feel Blair's throat work beneath his fingertips. "No," she agrees softly, "I never have."

The extent of Dan's history with Blair is: once they made out in the back of a taxi, and then went back to her place. Wrapped around each other in her bed but still dressed, _she_ came, moaning loud and throaty, and then she fell asleep. Seriously. She came and then kissed him until she passed out, her tremors still running through his body. There was nothing to it except to jerk off in the bathroom and then go back to bed, letting her soft arms encircle him as she snuggled close. That was it. They never talked about it. It still makes him crazy to think about – the flutter of her lashes, her flushed cheeks, the way she bit her lip. Nothing gets him going like the memory of Blair's orgasm, her fingers gripping his arms so hard. 

They were both fall-down drunk, so it's probably better nothing happened. 

She's his friend, and he'd rather have that.

"You like him a lot, though." The repeated pass of her hand over his jaw is almost hypnotic – or maybe that's the alcohol talking. "Carter. I can tell."

"It's not serious," Dan says, and he'll keep saying it until it sounds true.

 

 

In bed, much more successfully than last time:

"Can you –" Carter starts, and –

"Uh-huh," Dan says, hand going up around Carter's throat automatically, pressing harder when he feels Carter swallow. 

 

 

"I liked watching you go down on that girl," Carter says.

Sunday morning finds Dan exhausted from a late shift at the bookstore the night before that followed quick on the heels of an entire day at the office pretending to be useful: answering phones, filing, typing, trying to write in spare snatches of time, mostly meandering around the internet. Carter is here because Carter is always here now. He has a spare key and he rarely bothers crashing with Serena anymore, unless one or the other of them is feeling weird about how their relationship definitely is _not_ a relationship at all. 

So Dan has coffee while he reads. Carter says inappropriate shit. It's all very _as per usual_.

"Yeah," Dan says dryly, "I could tell."

They've seen Marisol again and it went as well as the first time: nice, casual, Carter's idea. Dan ate her out while Carter fucked him, kissed his neck, called him pet names. Somehow having another person there mitigated whatever wigged Dan out, making it less real and more performance: Dan, playing the part of Carter's boyfriend to a captive audience. 

Carter is sprawled on the other end of the couch, lazily trailing a feathery cat toy along the ground while Sylvia loses her entire mind, flip-flopping around so fast she resembles nothing so much as a white tumbleweed. "I liked seeing you like that."

"You like telling me what you like."

Carter grins, wolfish. He only ever calls Marisol _that girl_ when he's trying to initiate dirty talk. It's a way of fitting her into her role: that girl they fool around with sometimes. "You're moody today."

Dan turns a page. "You like that too?"

Carter flicks the toy away (Sylvia skitters after it with a patter of paws) and sits up, sliding a hand up Dan's chest. "I liked tasting her on your mouth, your lips all slick." He thumbs over Dan's mouth, musing, "Kind of tart." And then he pulls away entirely, dropping back against the arm of the couch. "But you don't wanna hear this."

Dan looks down at him, thinking _tease_. "I don't?"

"I know you think I got too much to say. Can't help it. Benefits of being a big slut my whole life, I know what I want."

"I know, I know, as you like to remind me _ad nauseam_." 

Things don't really get deep enough (ha ha, _deep_ enough) between them for them to fight over anything, but if they were going to have an argument, it'd be about this. Dan doesn't consider himself uptight about sex (theoretically), especially considering the long way he's come from the over-Googling virgin of his teenage years. He just doesn't have as much to say about it as Carter does. 

Dan sighs. "Alright," he says. "Cut me a break. This shit's new for me." He shuts his book and sets it aside. "Anything you want to know, ask away."

Carter tilts his head, observing Dan thoughtfully. "Serena was your first everything, wasn't she?"

"Pretty much." He lets himself be a little mean then, for no good reason. Just to be mean. "How many people have you been with? Or don't you know?"

Predictably, Carter is unbothered. "I counted it up once," he says. "Tried to, anyway."

"And?"

"Realized I don't care much for numbers."

"Realized you couldn't count that high?" Dan jokes, and is rewarded with a shove. He lets himself get closer then, kisses Carter on the mouth, pulls back but stays close. Pointedly, he says, "I want to hear it. I _like_ hearing it."

Carter smirks a little before they kiss again, mumbling against Dan's mouth, "You think I don't fuckin' know that?"

 

 

Out at the bar on Friday, Dan a little drunk, Carter a lot sober. Nate has broken up with Autumn and is therefore being overly solicitous with Blair, which is very obviously getting under Sean's skin. Serena is entertaining two different boys that she somehow picked up on the trip over to the bar but she clearly isn’t all that interested in either of them, just honing her skills. 

Dan looks around at all of them, feeling tipsy and relaxed. "I don't know what I'm doing with you," he laughs, and he's letting himself rest against Carter's side, pressed tight with a hand gripping a fistful of Carter's shirt.

"Most people don't, handsome," Carter says. He's doing that fond voice people use with drunks sometimes. 

"Handsome Dan, that's the Yale mascot," Dan informs him. "I think that whenever you call me handsome."

Carter rakes Dan's hair back and then untangles it a little, causing one curl to drop back against Dan's forehead. "You're a sight cuter than a bulldog, I promise."

"I love when you talk like a cowboy, you fucking trusafarian," Dan says, laughing again, and lets Carter kiss him right there in front of everyone. 

By the time they leave Dan has pretty much sobered up, but he still feels easy and loose, untethered. It gets him thinking and looking at Carter sideways; as soon as they get in, Dan is shoving him off towards the bathroom.

"Shower," he says, " _Thorough_ ," and Carter gives him a raised-eyebrow look of intrigue.

"Handsome has a plan, huh?"

When Carter gets out, Dan wastes no time yanking the towel from his hips, getting him on his stomach on the bed, and then kneeling on the floor next to it. "I think this is more within my skill set," Dan says, and spreads Carter open, puts his mouth there, tongue against Carter.

"Are you using a _dental dam_?" Carter says, though he doesn't altogether seem to mind: unlike Dan's handful of failure blowjobs, this has an immediate audible response. Short, needy, short staccato groans interspersed with a lot of Dan's name and some very choice swearing.

Dan pulls back with a little bit of a groan himself. "Those sounds you make drive me fucking crazy."

Carter is resting his face on his folded arms and all Dan can see is his profile: furrowed brow, eyelashes against his flushed cheek, lips parted. "Yeah," he breathes, an unthinking agreement. 

Dan grins slowly, studying him. "How you doing over there?"

Carter's eye opens, fixing Dan with a half-hearted glare. "Don't go getting all smug on –" but it peters off into a moan, eyes fluttering shut again as Dan presses the tip of his thumb into Carter, just gently. He massages the spot, biting his lip as he considers the situation, and then lets the little square of latex slip to the floor before lowering his head again. He's rewarded with a breathless, strangled exclamation. 

It's really not _that_ bad. 

Dan pulls away to trail a kiss over the back of Carter's thigh, sinking his teeth into the tender skin. "Turn over," he murmurs. "Give me your hand."

A little shiver runs through Dan as Carter does what he says, unspeaking, his gaze heavy-lidded and lingering. Dan drops a probably stupid, definitely thoughtless kiss to Carter's knuckles before grabbing the lube off the bedside table and slicking Carter's fingers. Then he sits back. 

"Go ahead," he says. "Show me what you got."

Their eyes still locked (though Carter seems to be having trouble keeping his open), Carter reaches between his legs, past his hard cock, and starts teasing himself with his index finger. It doesn't take long before his body takes most of it, and then the next few at Dan's quiet, soft-voiced urging. "C'mon. One more."

A bead of precome leaks from the tip of Carter's dick, smearing across his skin. Dan wants to lick it; he always wants that more theoretically than he ever seems to in action. Carter's eyes finally shut as his breathing goes deep and quick. His tongue flicks out to wet his bottom lip. 

"Keep going," Dan tells him. "I'll be right back."

Dan goes into the bathroom to rinse his mouth out a few times (thorough showers or not, he isn't going to kiss someone on the mouth after sticking his tongue up their ass) and looks at himself in the mirror. His eyes are a little bright and color's high in his face, but just enough to make him look healthy, eager. He looks calm. He _feels_ calm.

When he returns Carter is all worked up, making repeated trapped noises in his throat as he presses down against his fingers. There's something a little frustrated about it, like he can't quite get the angle right. His other hand strokes his cock, though he keeps having to grip tight at the base, getting himself under control.

Dan tugs off his clothes as he watches, then gets on the bed next to Carter so he can kiss his slack mouth, hand slipping downwards. 

"You fucker, you took forever," Carter mumbles.

Dan smiles. His fingertips find Carter's slick knuckles, trace over where they disappear into his body. Then, very carefully, he starts to work one finger in alongside Carter's. "Should I say something cheesy about it being worth the wait?"

Carter makes a helpless gasping sound. "If you don't fuck me in the next minute I'm going to lose my mind."

"Yeah?" Dan makes him slow his pace to an almost leisurely slide. "Then maybe you should ask nice."

"You want an engraved invitation?"

Dan nips at Carter's earlobe, kisses wetly at his throat. "I want to hear how desperate you are."

Carter breathes a soft swearword but barely a minute passes before words are spilling from him, shameless in this as in everything. "Please fuck me – c'mon, fuck me, I'm dying here, honey –"

And Dan kisses him to shut him up, getting to it as quick at he can.

He wonders how many people Carter has been with, how many people have done this to him – a number that couldn't be counted, apparently. It's not jealousy, exactly, though Dan wouldn't deny feeling that to some extent; it's just that old feeling he used to have, of being the most unremarkable one in a crowd. But he makes himself shake it off because it doesn't matter, because Carter is gripping tight to him and still begging even though Dan is inside him now, giving him what he wants. 

"I know," Dan soothes in between hard kisses. "I know."

He knows what Carter likes by now so Dan fucks him harder, faster, all the porn heat-of-the-moment words, but Carter shakes his head a little, says, "Slow – slow –"

Dan looks at him, his eyes shut tight as he fidgets, pushing back against Dan. And he slows himself down, all languorous thrusts and dragging, sweat-slicked skin. "Is that good?" Dan murmurs, low. "Is that what you want?"

"Oh, Dan," Carter breathes, kissing Dan again and again. "Oh, fuck, honey –"

 

 

This is the end:

Carter has gradually taken up residence in Dan apartment: the long-ago stolen toothbrush, the overpriced hair product designed to make him look effortlessly tousled, his razor next to Dan's, his clothes strewn by the laundry basket because he refuses to take a drawer but is also too messy to keep things in his bag. It's been four months since the last time he left town, maybe five, and that's a long time for Carter. That is a very long time. 

So it's both a surprise and not when he says he's leaving. 

He does his whole rebel without a clue act, shrugging his shoulders and lighting a cigarette. "Dunno," he says when Dan asks where and for how long. 

"Ah," Dan murmurs, quelling his disappointment. "Well. I guess…it's been nice having sex with you."

Carter rolls his eyes but smiles. "Back at you." He pauses, taking a posed-looking drag. "I _am_ coming back, you know. I'm not going off to war."

Dan gives him a curious look, starting to smile a little. "You're not, huh?"

Carter fidgets. " _No_."

Seems nothing to it then but to kiss Carter on the mouth, a cool and detached goodbye kiss that warms up when Carter pulls him closer. "So," Dan says, "Got time for a last hurrah?"

"Oh yeah," Carter replies, against his mouth, "I always make time for a couple of those."

 

 

Three weeks later, Carter's back.


End file.
